Johnny Depp Lines Up ‘Mortdecai’ to Wash Out Taste of ‘The Lone Ranger’

Though 'The Lone Ranger' is still in theaters, with a less than $50 million five-day opening, the film is already in contention for one of the year's biggest misfires, if not outright failures. That Johnny Depp is currently lining up a new project means one of two things: He's rethinking what roles he should play or he taking big paydays while they're still around. That next project? 'Mortdecai.'

Currently the film is set up at Lionsgate where it will be written and directed by David Koepp. The two worked together before on Koepp's Stephen King adaptation 'Secret Window.' 'Mortdecai,' as The Hollywood Reporter notes, is based on the novel 'The Great Mortdecai Moustache Mystery' by Kyril Bonfiglioli and is about a suave but possibility duplicitous art dealer who "must traverse the globe armed only with his good looks and special charm in a race to recover a stolen painting rumored to contain the code to a lost bank account filled with Nazi gold.”"

This sounds like Depp's bid at doing a 'Raiders'(or perhaps more pointedly, a 'National Treasure')-esque adventure film, which would be a nice break from the more freakish characters he's been playing lately. The question is how much he turns up the charm. It's hard to know when this fits in Depp's schedule, as currently he's filming Wally Pfister's directorial debut 'Transcendence,' while he's also up for 'Into the Woods' and 'Pirates of the Caribbean 5.'